Wednesday, March 28, 2007

So I guess whatever neighbor I was picking up internet access from sensed that I was stealing from him and now the internet is gone... so I am at my parents house on my lunch break checking my email and such... I will hopefully be getting my own internet shortly, but till then the posting and answering of emails will be few and far between.

The apartment is lovely... haven't had time in the last two days to unpack anything really, so my room and the second room are still in boxes... my living room is pretty settled and now I am just waiting for a couch, which will be coming in the next month.

Last night I went to this young women's thing for our church at my friend Shannon's house... it was actually pretty cool, I met some nice people and we really got to share some stuff with each other. It is a once a month thing, but it will be really cool. While I was there I was telling shannon that I needed a microwave for my apartment and low and behold she happens to be getting a new one and she said I can take her old one... do you know how exciting this makes me? now I can eat all this food that I bought last sunday... I just needed a microwave to heat it all up!!! Exciting times.

I had a meeting this morning at work at 9:30 that was kind of a last minute thing, but we were told we all had to be there so that we can re-enroll in the benefits... so I got up and went to work 4 hours before I was actually supposed to... turns out we really didn't have to be there and that they were just explaining our benefits and the entire meeting lasted a whole of 15 minutes... a 20minute drive for a 15 minutes meeting... so frustrating!!! so I think I will take this opportunity to get a nap in and watch a movie before I head off to work again this afternoon... especially since I am working until 11pm tonight (lovely night program!!)

Sunday, March 25, 2007

First stop St. Malachy's chapel (The Actor's chapel)... Very Catholic in decor, but low and behold the organ rang out with "There's no Business Like Show Business"... AWESOME! I was disappointed to see no angel with jazz hands in any of the frescos.

The students sang some tunes for local patrons... it was niceAfter the chapel it was off to China Town for some reputable shopping... but on the way we drove past the famous Copacabana which is unfortunately is closing down... The kids were so excited because they had just finished their musical about the famous night clubAhh Chinatown... I got a Tiffany's ring, a couple pashminas, and a samurai sword... awesome!I was a master at the haggling... I got the $20 sword for only $11... and a tiffany's bracelet and ring for $12 together... everyone with me was so impressed, but what can I say after being taken to yardsales for my whole life by my mom and learning from the master herself, what can I say... I am my mother's daughter.

So after Chinatown we left the city and drove back to Newark airport in Jersey... and flew home... I have to say as much as I love the city and had so much fun, I could never live there... but I am fully planning on another trip to the city soon.

Such a great show... I was so pleased! Even though our seats were in the nosebleed section, it was still so much fun!

We had another workshop with Hairspray cast members and then walked to the theater... we were early so the students and chaperones got to split up for lunch (that's right I had a whole hour and a half without students) So Shryock, Chez, Sarah, Alysssa (another chaperone), and I headed to get some real New York sushi... yum!After the show we headed to dinner at Angelo's right next to the Late Show building. Then to the Rockefeller Building for a view of the city after dark... this is the empire state building

Surprisingly enough, the students were exhausted enough to opt for heading back to the hotel instead of doing more city activities... I was kind of dissappointed because it was our last night in New York, odd how i was more awake than the high schoolers, but we ended up going back to the hotel.

This day has lots of fun stories to go along with it... to begin we went to a workshop with some cast members from Mama Mia... I got to take part in learning the song and the dance... really fun. Then we went to go see the show which was a really fun show... lots of energy and color and hit ABBA songs... great! Then we got to have a free night roaming around Time Square having dinner and seeing shows.

jazz hands... that is me in the black leggings and green striped shirt near the backMama mia... here I go againSo after the show we were on our own... I had about 10 students with me who wanted to go see Spamalot... unfortunately there were only 3 seats left... sad timesSo instead we went to see The Drowsy Chaperone (see the symobolism?) It was absolutely fantastic... so funny and for anyone who is a theater fan, you'll totally get all the jokes and humorSo after we got our tickets for the show, we had several hours to walk around and have dinner... a couple of the students and I went to the best diner in Manhattan voted by the Daily News... it was called The Westway Diner... But as we were walking around looking for something to eat we had a quintessential New York moment... We got caught in the middle of a fight between a drunken pedestrian (it was St. Patty's Day remember) and a bunch of guys and their mom in an SUV... they began yelling and throwing out obscenities! I was convinced someone was going to pull out a gun (you would have too if you'd have seen them)... and we were all standing on this corner waiting for a walk sign about 5 feet away... so I quickly ushered my kids to opposite direction (hard to do when they stop to gawk)... and then we laughed about the thought of me being gunned down and them being the only ones to carry on my story... but this is us at the diner, which had such delicious food. It was so New York Diner... we had so much fun!(clockwise around the table: Grace, Chris, Nicole, Noah, Jessica, Me, Tyler, and Sean)

Yay brother and sister shot! We sat together at the showAfter the show we rode the elevators at the Mariott Marquis to the 45th floor... Then to Roxi's in Time Square for delicious Cheesecake - thanks Lynches for the suggestion

Happy 18th Birthday Tyler!! (he woke up on his birthday in New York and it was the first time he saw snow fall... right outside his windowLady Liberty... in the snowWe sang happy birthday to Tyler on the ferry... the entire ferry sang and applauded!In battery park... I had just gotten hit by a snowball 2 seconds beforeTyler was sang to at Eileen Stardust Restaurant in time square... they went out of the way to make a big deal per request of a certain older sister.TIME SQUARE with a couple of the students!!! (Tyler took the picture) We got to walk around for a couple of hours and see all the stores and stuff... fun!To our delight we also got to meet up with a high school friend of mine - Mike Farfalla in Time Square... he is currently working in New York running sound for popular Broadway shows... making tons of money too.

NEW YORK TRIP... this will mostly be pictures and such... but I'll do my best to tell some stories too.

Mostly it was so much fun... exhausting too. I tell everyone that... the city is so crazy and busy and you are seriously pushing your way through millions of people on the street, but at the same time I had to be keeping track of near 10 students at a time. I had a lot of fun though... choir and drama kids are so funny and quirky. I also had forgotten that high school students have this type of humor where everything can be made dirty... so I really had to watch how I worded things or they would fall into fits of giggles.

I did everything a tourist could do.. so now I am ready to go back and just blend in... not have to go see Ellis Island, which was amazing, or the statue of liberty, which was lack-luster. I can just go and see New York through the back door and see lots of broadway shows.

Alright to start out you have to know that we were there during a huge snow storm... airports closed, schoold shut down... and we retarded arizonians out and about in Battery park, Liberty island, ellis island, ground zero and time square... so dumb, but we did it in the sleet and hail and snow. It only lasted one day and then the rest of the weekend we had this beautiful crisp winter chill and snow on the ground around the streets of 42nd street. Perfect new york experience.

Day 1: Red Eye Flight, Central Park, 5th Avenue - FAO Schwartz, 24 hour Apple Store, and Tiffany & Cothe whole plane was our... I slept maybe a total of 3 hours... in 15minute incriments - which equals no sleep at all.view of the city outside my window of the plane... just as the sun was rising.Central Park(above: Tavern on the green)(this dome was pretty cool... some of the choir kids got in and sang the national anthem - Tyler was one of them)We're at the met... singing... turns out that's illegal - A nice police officer told us that. =)Below is me and my new friend Sarah... she is the drama student teacher and my roomate for the trip... we clicked instantly and had a ton of fun together!Below is me in front of tiffany & co... don't I look like i belong in new york?Noah and I playing tunes on the keyboard at FAO Schwartz... what a movie moment huh?

Friday, March 23, 2007

It's strange sitting in my room without all of my stuff. My parents and I unloaded all of my stuff into my apartment this evening along with Shawn, Andy, Travis, and Mark Williams... it was a blast - Andy and his wife I have known for a while and are my neighbors. Travis is also a friend from church, and the younger brother of two of my best friends, and he lives in the apartments as well. Mark is Travis' dad. So all of them turned out for my big move in.... then we went to dinner. Now I am back home with just a hand-full of my stuff left and my room is feeling rather empty... there is a crazy echo in the absence of clutter. So tomorrow morning I am heading back there to finish taking some stuff over and then either tomorrow night or sunday night will be my first night in the place. I still have to go down and have SRP put the electricity in my name... plus i have to start changing my address for bills, subscriptions, netflix... etc.

I love my apartment... so cozy and mine! That's the big thing... the "mine" factor... it's a place that is just mine!!! I would post pictures but I realize I packed my cord that hooks my camera to the computer and it is now in a box in my living room across town. But tomorrow I may be able to get it up.

Also by the end of this weekend i will have a bunch unpacked, so I can relax and post some new york stuff... for right now I am going to call it a night with a movie and then sleep. Tyler's big 18th birthday party is tomorrow night and I have a big day ahead of me with helping my mom decorate and cook and spending some time at my place settling in.

It is late at night and yet I am unable to sleep... with a long day behind me and a even longer day of moving ahead of me, I find myself sitting in front of the computer not ready to rest my brain... perhaps I should be packing some more stuff for the big move into the apartment tomorrow (I have nothing packed) or maybe going thru my 264 pictures of new york to try to find ones to post or thereafter explain and convey my amazingly fun, exhausting, funny, and adventurous trip to new york - (can I also take this moment to say thank you to Jeannette for reading my blog and caring about my lack of posting).

But instead I am doing nothing productive and calculating the minutes until I have to get up in the morning to go to work - 8 hours.

I will try to post my pictures soon... but between working and now moving, it may take me some time... please bare with me and know I am glad to be home and so glad I had the opportunity of a wonderful New York trip! Talk to you soon!

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Kind of addicted to the new BBC Robin Hood. It aired on BBC in the UK last year and just started on BBC America on cable. I don't have the patience to wait a week at a time for each episode so instead I found an online place that had the first 9 episodes for free online (there are 13 total)... I watched them all in two days. Now I have 4 more episodes to go, and they are not online yet... ugh. The guy who plays Robin Hood kind of has a Joseph Fiennes circa Shakespeare in Love thing going for him which is very charming and refreshing. The whole thing is a little campy at times... but hey its Robin Hood - the story was made for campiness. Check out the link on my "Movies" list.

Tom is watching Casino Royale on his computer behind me... which is reminding me I need to buy that DVD, along with The Holiday and Peter Pan Platinum edition DVD. But not till after New York and after I rebuild the bank account.

If I don't post before I leave tonight, I'll see you all on tuesday and with tons of pictures of parking meters and windows and hot dog stands. Seriously I brought 2 memory cards with enough to take over 700 pictures.

9 hours and counting till I am at the airport... minor set back in New York excitement... I got the sweatshirt (dun-dun-duh). It is, how should I put this?... Horrible. The design and look of it is really sub-par, but the clincher in the whole buzz-kill of it is they either got the order wrong or students took the wrong sizes, because 5 girls including me were left with no other choice but to take home a medium... AN ADULT MEDIUM, which is little more than a moo-moo on me. The sleeves are about 6 inches too long, the thing comes down to my knees... and I paid $20 for this. Now I am fully intending on 1.) not wearing it on tour and 2.) asking for either my money back or a small sweatshirt which I paid for. I am mortified! But to be a good sport and to be apart of the tour color scheme I will buy a cheap navy sweatshirt to match (all they want is to be able to pick you out of the busy New York crowd easily and honestly - mission accomplished with the drastic red streaks in my hair). So because of my humiliation of possibly having to wear the vomit-inducing peice of cloth I didn't fall asleep till 12:30 and then woke up bright eyed and bushy tailed at 6:30 this morning... so going on 6 hours of sleep I won't be getting more than 4 hours of sleep tonight and I will be ready to wander around time square tomorrow morning... ugh.

In other orders of business it will be raining all the days that we have stuff scheduled outdoors and it'll be sunny the days we are inside seeing shows and such...ugh.

Monday, March 12, 2007

So what motivated me to put bright red streaks in my hair, you may ask? I needed something new and drastic and spunky!!! I was tired of the same old Miranda... so I went down to Dolce Salon and Spa and livened myself up a bit. I LOVE IT too!!!

Thanks Nicole for the great idea of red... I thought it would match most of my clothes.

Wednesday, March 07, 2007

So sad... I named my car after that man... and to think he was shot in the head outside a court room... I do hope this is not forshadowing. Moment of silence for Captain America... ... moment of silence complete - carry on.

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

Just watched Tyler on NBC's Mid-Day show... he tapped his little heart out along with the Copacabana boys... it was so cool. I am excited about opening night tomorrow night! Anyone who needs tickets, please let my mom and I know.

Got my itinerary for New York this morning also... actually I just stole Tyler's packet to look at. It will be so awesome... we will be taking tons of tours and I'll be able to have a lot of time to explore (with some students with me of course). Also found out that Saturday night in NY, we will get to do whatever we want (with students)... we can go see a show, shopping, enjoy the general splendor of New York. I have decided I am going to convince some kids to go see another show with me... (we will have just seen Mama Mia that afternoon). I am thinking Jersey Boys, Wicked, or Spamalot! Sounds fun.

Sunday, March 04, 2007

Got back at 1am this morning from 2 days in Disneyland... It was a blast - absolutely perfect! Kendra and I didn't use a single fastpass and the longest we waited in line was 30minutes. Not busy at all. We had so much time to do things because it wasn't too busy that we had time to watch a parade, go shopping, meet characters. The weather was wonderful - I am wearing shorts in the picture above. We even got to meet captain Jack Sparrow (amazing), got serenaded by the Dapper Dans on main street (I have such a crush on those guys), and we hung out with Mater and Lightening McQueen from Cars!

Kendra had never been to California Adventure and she loved it! We had such a great time. Although we did have a little snag with getting to Anaheim - mapquest is evil to unsuspecting travelers, but my dad (via cell phone) ushered us to our destination and as a result I will never forget how to get to Disneyland! It was so much fun... enjoy the pictures below of our joy and merriment!Empty streets in the morning:Captain Jack Sparrow:The Dapper Dans (new crushes):Lightening McQueen himself:Mater "It's like Tamater without the Ta":Mary Poppins - practically perfect in every way: